If there is one thing opponents and proponents of the death penalty in California can agree on, it is that the current death penalty system doesn’t work. With one of the largest death rows in the world, California has over 740 people awaiting execution, few of whom are likely to be executed.

Most of this backlog has to do with the robust — and complex — system of appeals, part of which happens in state courts and also federal courts. Proposition 66, backed by the California District Attorneys Association, purports to expedite the death penalty by addressing the state appeals system.

To address the lack of trained lawyers available to represent those sentenced to death, the measure would expand the pool of available lawyers by requiring attorneys currently qualified to handle non-death penalty appeals cases to accept appointments to death row cases or be prohibited from handling appellate cases entirely.

Given the long, complicated nature of such cases, it is possible many lawyers will simply choose not to practice appellate cases. We also wonder if forcing attorneys without the background to take on death penalty cases makes much sense.

The measure also sets an arbitrary five-year limit by which courts are supposed to decide a series of appeals. Expedience should not be the goal in a system that could potentially execute an innocent person. To date, more than 150 people nationwide have been exonerated from death row, including three in California.

That there are more than 740 condemned inmates and no currently accepted execution procedure suggests the most we would achieve is a further burdening of the already strained court system with added case- loads, while spending millions in the process.

California has spent billions of dollars on the flawed death penalty system since 1978. Potentially unworkable tweaks to a failed system aren’t what California needs. Vote no on 66.

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